Colombian electoral authority accuses president Gustavo Petro of campaign irregularities

On Tuesday, Colombia's National Electoral Council (CNE), the highest authority of its kind in the country, formally accused the campaign of Gustavo Petro, now president and then candidate, of irregularities in financing.

This Tuesday the Full Chamber of the CNE decided to open an investigation and formulate official charges against the campaign that led Petro to the presidency in 2022 for, according to the accusations, violating the financing ceilings allowed by law by receiving millionaire donations that he did not register.

In addition to the accusation against Petro, when he was a candidate, the now-president of the state-owned oil company Ecopetrol, Ricardo Roa, who in 2022 served as the head of the leftist's campaign, is also accused.

Of the 9 magistrates that make up the Full Chamber, only two abstained while seven agreed to accuse the campaign of the now president after it was known that the teachers union FECODE donated 500 million Colombian pesos (a little more than $120,000 ), without Petro's platform recording the transaction. Likewise, the leftist Polo Democrático party made an equal donation which, although initially reported, was later left off the final campaign reports. The campaign also did not report millions of dollars in payments to electoral witnesses and other contributions.

Although the National Electoral Council does not have the power to remove the president, the formulation of charges and the investigation could end up in the hands of the Congressional Accusations Committee, which could start an impeachment trial against Petro.

Gustavo Petro has reacted with fury. On his social networks he said that the CNE's accusation constituted a "coup d'état."

In a message considered polarizing and hostile by the opposition, on October 8, Gustavo Petro shared on his X account that "all popular organizations in the country must enter into permanent assembly."

"The time for the generalized mobilization of the Colombian people has arrived. The constitutional president of Colombia elected by popular vote orders the public force not to raise a single weapon against the people. I ask the diplomatic corps for a full meeting to explain to the world why what the CNE has done by majority is a coup against the full jurisdiction of the president and against the popular vote and the law," Petro added.

Later that night, from the Casa de Nariño, the presidential palace, Petro addressed Colombians to emphasize that, according to him, there is an attempted coup d'état against him. For Petro, although the CNE "is not able to force me to leave office" it opened "the door."

This is not the first time that irregularities in the financing of the campaign of Colombia's leftist president have been the subject of controversy. The president's son himself testified before the Attorney General's Office that his father's campaign had been financed with money from drug trafficking and organized crime. Later, Nicolás Petro, the president's son, withdrew his testimony in what was one of the most controversial investigations by the Colombian Prosecutor's Office against the president and his campaign.

Also, in April, U.S. State Department deputy spokesman Vedant Patel stated during a press conference that he believed that Gustavo Petro had financed his presidential campaign with irregular money.